by Desi Serda
I never expected to be a nurse. I did not see that in myself until I started college and liked working with people. I love people. Grumpy people are the biggest challenge and it’s quite satisfying to kill them with kindness where they have no choice but to at least give you a little respect.
I started out in the Hospital but that was short lived. I wanted to get to know people not just see them and them be gone three days later. I worked in a nursing home for 18 years before I started at a facility for the mentally ill. Please enjoy my journey through my memories of my career.
Mike was quite the old cowboy. He had the funniest sense of humor. He always asked me are you an apple or a pear? I would tell him an apple and he would just laugh and tell me “I like them sweet apples”.
I was standing at the nurses’ station when Mike walked up. He tells me, ” I like you. If I was 30 years younger I would court you”. I am all tickled he is such a sweet guy but he had his ornery moments too, so we learned to enjoy his sweet ones.
Mike then looks at me and says “don’t tell my wife, I wouldn’t want to hurt her feelings”. I promised not to tell his wife. This would have been really hard to do since she had been gone for over fifteen years. He didn’t remember that.
Mike turned to walk away. I watched as he walked down the hallway, blue jean coveralls on, one side unbuckled hanging down and naked as the day he was born underneath to go back towards his room. I do not know what his fascination was with body shapes but apparently I was an apple and he liked apples ….for that day anyway.
I could have taken his comments in two ways. He must have thought I was much older than I was and could have been offended if he wasn’t so darn cute and sincere in his words. I chose to take it as a blessing that he was happy with himself and offered to court me, had he been younger.
When Mike passed away it was very sad for me. I got to see the best side of him. I could see the young flirty man he was inside and what a blessing it is that there are parts of ourselves we never lose.
This was Chapter 1 from There is Life in a Nursing Home by Desi Serda.
Reserve your copy of her full book by emailing Desi here… d.serda@ymail.com
Leave a Reply